Big Brother in Chicago

Mayor of the City of Chicago has outlined elaborate camera network. The plan is to monitor the city a vast security network from a hi-tech command center. Thousands of surveillance cameras will be linked – and authorities will be alerted to crimes and terrorist acts.

Some people are concerned about “Big Brother” invading their privacy but Mayor Daley says the cameras will be located in public areas. The city’s plan is to route the live images provided by those cameras on the public way into a unified network piped into the 911 Center. There are well over 2,000 cameras that the city and its sister agencies – like the school system – monitor everyday. The city is adding another 250 cameras to potential high risk areas, most of them downtown.

That includes every city department. That includes the Chicago public schools, the CTA, city colleges. That includes the park district, any other sister agencies that have cameras out there.

Remind me exactly, how that is not Big Brother…

The Mayor retors:

You could photograph me walking down the street. They do it every day. I don’t object. You do it every day. You have that right. Why do you have that right?

Hm, I never thought that someone in his position would equate the rights of the individual (to take pictures in public places) to the ‘rights’ of the state (to monitor its citizens in public).

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